Remember to save a few for the promoter who booked you, the sound guy and your driver. Also it doesn’t hurt to put a few pins on some nice looking ladies. If the club is ok with stickers plastered all over it like CBGBs be sure to go to town!

By the way, I will make some Wire to the Ear merchandise later this year!

Stickers and rock buttons are seriously important for any band to have. These are the classic promotional items because they are cheap to make and when displayed promote your name. What’s more important to you: The latest X-Box game or 250 4.25″ square stickers to give away? Both will run you about $60.

I like to keep my my stickers and rock buttons black with white printing. Besides keeping the cost low it stands out the most.

For rock buttons (or pins as I like to call them) I use the popular RockButtons.com. The size you want is 1 inch. At least thats the standard size you see on every punk rockers jacket. 250 pins will cost you $65 and you can have 2 designs in that bunch. For $115 you can have 500 pins and 3 designs. For the rock buttons color doesn’t cost more. You can also add your website URL or slogan printed along the edge of the pin at no extra charge.

You can also make your own rock buttons. You need to buy a button making machine and the button parts. Check out buttonmakers.net for everything you need to know.

When it comes to stickers your going to want to check out stickerguy.com. I discovered them when watching the video below by a guy named “Brian Botkiller“. You want stickers that are each on a separate cut. If you get them on a roll you will have to cut each sticker from the roll. This doesn’t really work in practice (I’ve tried it). You think to yourself I’ll just cut them in advance but stickers cut from a roll are bent and don’t hold their shape in a stack… it’s messy. Luckily stickerguy is so freakin inexpensive you can afford their cut stickers. Orders from stickerguy take up to 8 weeks so order well in advance of when you need them.

With both rockbuttons.com and stickerguy.com you upload your designs via a web interface. They offer templates for Photoshop and Illustrator you can download.

The best time to hand out your free gifts is during any low in your live set. In between songs or any long breakdown. If you have any technical problems hand stuff out to buy some love! Remember to keep a few extra giveaways for the promoter and any nice looking ladies that you meet after the show.

By the way both the places I mention in this post are in the USA. If anyone knows any rock bottom cheap places to manufacture this stuff in Berlin please let me know in the comments.